Dear Frontex Transparency Office, Frontex has two expert opinions from this year that address the question if it can acquire weapon. I am sure you are able to find them. Mit freundlichen Grüßen Arne Semsrott Anfragenr: 197877 Antwort an: <<E-Mail-Adresse>> Laden Sie große Dateien zu dieser Anfrage hier hoch: https://fragdenstaat.de/a/197877/ Postanschrift Arne Semsrott << Adresse entfernt >>

Dear Frontex, can I expect an answer from you in this case or should I ask the Ombudsman to intervene? Mit freundlichen Grüßen Arne Semsrott Anfragenr: 197877 Antwort an: <<E-Mail-Adresse>> Laden Sie große Dateien zu dieser Anfrage hier hoch: https://fragdenstaat.de/a/197877/ Postanschrift Arne Semsrott << Adresse entfernt >>

Dear Transparency Office, the link doesn't work. If you just send an e-mail I can reply to it. Mit freundlichen Grüßen Arne Semsrott Anfragenr: 197877 Antwort an: <<E-Mail-Adresse>> Laden Sie große Dateien zu dieser Anfrage hier hoch: https://fragdenstaat.de/a/197877/ Postanschrift Arne Semsrott << Adresse entfernt >>

Dear Transparency Office, please find my response from 3 October that you still haven't answered to. Please get your inbox in order. I was asking for reports from this year. https://fragdenstaat.de/anfrage/gutacht… Mit freundlichen Grüßen Arne Semsrott Anfragenr: 197877 Antwort an: <<E-Mail-Adresse>> Laden Sie große Dateien zu dieser Anfrage hier hoch: https://fragdenstaat.de/a/197877/ Postanschrift Arne Semsrott << Adresse entfernt >>

Dear Transparency Office, please find my message to you again from 3 October: "Dear Frontex Transparency Office, Frontex has two expert opinions from this year that address the question if it can acquire weapon. I am sure you are able to find them. Mit freundlichen Grüßen Arne Semsrott" Mit freundlichen Grüßen Arne Semsrott Anfragenr: 197877 Antwort an: <<E-Mail-Adresse>> Laden Sie große Dateien zu dieser Anfrage hier hoch: https://fragdenstaat.de/a/197877/ Postanschrift Arne Semsrott << Adresse entfernt >>

Dear Frontex, Please forward this to the person responsible for reviewing confirmatory applications. On 26 September 2020 I filed an access to documents request asking for: All expert opinions ordered by Frontex in relation to the procurement of arms and ammunition. The request and all subsequent information can be found at https://fragdenstaat.de/anfrage/gutacht… The request was formulated in a sufficiently precise manner, and there is no suggestion to the contrary. My request was registered on 22 January 2021. On 8 February 2021, by letter with reference TO/PAD-2020-0017, Frontex identified five documents falling under the scope of my request, denying access to them under Article 4(2) first ident and (3) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001. Frontex justifies its refusal by stating that the documents “contain information regarding currently ongoing decision-making processes” that require “special protection”. Frontex also argues that disclosing four of the five documents would undermine the protection of commercial interests of legal persons. According to Frontex, a partial release of the documents could not be undertaken. I consider that Frontex’s refusal to provide access to the documents requested is misconceived, for the following reasons. Ground 1. Frontex did not explain how commercial interests would be undermined Frontex states that disclosure of four of the five documents would reveal “economic information on the competences and know-how and other commercial interests of current and future market actors”. The disclosure of this information “would undermine the protection of commercial interests of legal persons”. First, information on the competences and know-how of market actors are not protected by Regulation 1049/2001. Only specific commercial interests are. Second, Frontex has not specified which kind of commercial interests would be revealed and which current and future market actors would be affected by this. It is unclear how information from evaluations on the legality of weapons would affect actors that are currently not even active in a market. This lack of precision contravenes Frontex’s obligation to explain how disclosure would “specifically and actually” undermine the commercial interests protected. Third, Frontex is required, in accordance with the established case law of the CJEU, to explain how the purported risk to commercial interests is “foreseeable and not purely hypothetical”. It has failed even to particularise the nature of the purported risk or the legal persons affected by the risk, much less to establish that it reaches the threshold of “foreseeable and not purely hypothetical”. Ground 2. Decision-making processes are not protected per se The Regulation’s 1049/2001 explicit goal is to improve the transparency of the decision-making process. In this spirit, the Court of Justice of the European Union has held that the preliminary nature of documents that relate to a decision-making process does not in itself justify the application of the exception laid down in Article 4(3) of Regulation 1049/2001. The Court has also held that the fact that no agreement has yet been reached on the issues being debated does not therefore establish that the decision-making process is undermined by disclosure. To this regard, Frontex’s assertion that release of the requested documents would “hamper the ongoing and future” negotiations is a broad claim that does not offer substantial proof as to how the decision-making process would be seriously and foreseeably undermined. It follows that, in absence of such proof, Frontex’s argument that disclosure would “erode the mutual trust among the participants” remains purely hypothetical and unfounded, especially because Frontex has not even stated which negotiations the documents relate to and who is participating in these negotiations. Frontex claims that “disclosing the redacted parts would reveal negotiation positions of the stakeholders” when it has not redacted any part of a document, but denied access to them as a whole. Ground 3. Frontex’s failure to provide partial disclosure is unlawful Article 4 (6) of Regulation 1049/2001 provides: “If only parts of the requested document are covered by any of the exceptions, the remaining parts of the document shall be released.” As highlighted above, the proposition that the totality or even a substantial part of the five documents requested relates to ongoing decision-making processes or commercial interests is not sustainable. Partial disclosure must therefore be considered, consistently with the provisions of Article 4(6) of Regulation 1049/2001 and the principle of widest possible access. Frontex alleges that partial access cannot be granted to the requested documents “as their redaction would be disproportional in relation to the parts that are eligible for disclosure, simultaneously undermining the principle of sound administration.”. This is inconsistent with the terms of Article 4(6), which provides that the scope of disclosure is determined with reference to the exceptions laid out in Article 4, rather than a test of proportionality. Ground 4. There is a clear public interest in the disclosure of the requested documents Frontex alleges that “the administrative burden necessary to identify and redact the releasable materials would be disproportionate to the public interest in the disclosure exercise itself.” That assertion is false. The documents requested are likely to contain important legal arguments regarding the use of and conduct with lethal weapons. Their use is tightly linked to fundamental rights that constitute an essential pillar of the European legal order. There is a manifest public interest in transparency relating to the use of weapons by European Union officials. To date, there have been several media reports on this topic, for example EUObserver and Spiegel, as well as concerns being raised - including on a lack of transparency - by 40 Members of the European Parliament on this issue precisely. [1] For these reasons, I consider that Frontex is legally obligated to provide the requested documents. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any doubts or questions in regards to this confirmatory application. Sincerely, Arne Semsrott [1] https://twitter.com/ernesturtasun/statu… Anfragenr: 197877 Antwort an: <<E-Mail-Adresse>> Laden Sie große Dateien zu dieser Anfrage hier hoch: https://fragdenstaat.de/a/197877/ Postanschrift Arne Semsrott << Adresse entfernt >>

Sorry, just to clarify my confirmatory application: I meant PAD 2020-00179, not TO/PAD-2020-0017. Mit freundlichen Grüßen Arne Semsrott Anfragenr: 197877 Antwort an: <<E-Mail-Adresse>> Laden Sie große Dateien zu dieser Anfrage hier hoch: https://fragdenstaat.de/a/197877/ Postanschrift Arne Semsrott << Adresse entfernt >>